The article stresses "washing, wiping and sanitizing", all good things.

I'd add two points, that I've elaborated on in the past: First, cross train employees, particularly in smaller firms, so that no one employee has to come to work to do a vital job (such as running payroll, or ordering beer). Second, allow employees to take sick days without a prior doctor's visit or note. If you require the employee to come to work, or at least not get paid sick leave, until he can get in to see a doctor, you can have an active disease vector in the office for days or weeks. Might also be a good idea to look at annual flu shots, and perhaps make it cheap and convenient for employees to get them - ask a health care person to drop by the office with some needles.

I've also published some information on touch point sanitation, involving microfiber wipes and an accelerated hydrogen peroxide sanitizer; with no more time than it would take you to clean the grubby prints off the door jamb, you can sanitize it, while preventing cross-contamination during the sanitation process.

Finally, Dr. Gerba (known in the trade as Doctor Germ - and you thought your nickname was off-color) has done some interesting, and evocative, studies of germ load on common surfaces in the workplace.

09/26/2013

The can replacement is envisioned as a move to encourage less trash generation and more recycling. It is also touted as a cost savings for the county government (presumably in lower landfill fees) and as a health benefit for county employees, who will now walk down the hall every so often to empty their one quart trash cans into a thoughtfully provided larger receptacle.

While I'm all for rational environment-benefiting programs, at first blush I wonder if any calculation was made about county employee productivity, given the time away from the desk emptying trash, and to the extra cost in the janitorial budget due to the janitor having to retrieve trash that has missed or overflowed the can. Also, might any thought have been given to sprains and strains from reaching for, or bending over to grab, the trash overflow? In general, we find, in cleaning hundreds of facilities of most all descriptions, that productivity increases, and cost decreases, when we increase trash can size. We can dump a given can less often (depending, naturally, on what goes into it), we spend less time picking up overflow trash, less time cleaning the carpet from the occasional carpet staining overflow (that cold cup of coffee, for example), and so on.

A couple of other points are made by denizens of the Government Center. The Center houses courtrooms; folks coming to court bring reams of documentation, super size sodas, and lots of other stuff, that all goes into (or next to) county trash cans regardless of size. Same for folks renewing driver licenses, passports, and so on. Other folks visit their probation officers and bring along urine samples (don't want to go there).

As one judge observed, "This may sound insensitive, but size really does matter."

09/25/2013

It seems that, due to budget cuts, Chicago elementary schools are running out of a rather essential commodity: restroom toilet paper. So the Alderman is holding a toilet paper drive.

According to the Huff Post, “In many schools, including mine, there are no funds left for janitorial supplies –- and this includes toilet paper," Chicago teacher Michelle Gunderson told the Daily Kos before a toilet paper drive. “What might seem juvenile to some is in fact a perfect metaphor for the disregard of human dignity -- the Chicago Public Schools care so little about children that their basic needs are being neglected.” It seems that TP is allocated from the same budget as teacher salaries.

One doubtless recalls the 2012 Chicago teachers' strike, when the highest paid elementary school teachers in the nation struck over a plan to expand the school day to seven and a half hours, and to rate teacher performance. (If memory serves, Chicago doesn't quite manage to translate high teacher pay into outstanding student achievement, but that's another issue.)

The last time I recall another large institution's restrooms running out of toilet paper, it was the nation of Venezuela. Of course, Venezuela is a one party, authoritarian, socialist society....

09/13/2013

Ran across an article out of Riverside County, California. Seems a high school custodian, while cleaning a restroom, drove off a pair of potential rapists by spraying them with graffiti remover. Quick thinking, and an effective alternate use for the chemical.

Somewhat similarly, I limit the number of squirt bottles in our caddies by looking for concoctions with multiple effective uses. For instance, when we adopted Diversey's hydrogen peroxide based Alpha HP, a cleaner/sanitizer, we were able to retire four other products. The fewer bottles you have available, the less likely it is that you'll grab the wrong one. Limits mistakes, reduces inventory issues, simplifies training.

I do have to find out exactly what brand of graffiti remover was involved in the Riverside incident; it sounds like good stuff.

09/05/2013

Here's an interesting article, again via the Indoor Air Quality Association, on the lungs' reaction to incense smoke apparently being similar to their reaction to good old fashioned cigarette smoke. Not a big surprise, and probably not a major issue to us, shy those of us who frequent Indian restaurants.

We clean facilities with a view to improving human health, among the facility occupants. Likely the most significant impact we have is in improving indoor air quality, through HEPA filtration, careful chemical selection, wiping rather than feather dusting, vacuuming rather than dust mopping hard floors, and a lot of microfiber technology, both on floors and in dusting. We measure IAQ periodically, and generally see about a 50% reduction in daytime airborne particle count, in the size range of most allergens, compared to traditional methodology - about in line with the various studies that have been done on indoor air quality and janitorial methodology. Because of this focus, I try to keep on top of research in the areas of indoor air quality, vacuum cleaner filtration, and so on. So I run across a lot of articles. Perhaps I read too much.

What did catch my eye was the globalization of the article's origin. It's from the Indian Times, datelined London, citing a North Carolina study, initially concerned with incense in homes in the United Arab Emirates.

09/04/2013

Caught an interesting article via the Indoor Air Quality Association, one of a number of groups we're active in, mostly to keep current on industry related research. It's summarized in its opening paragraph:

"Though many children with asthma eventually grow out of the condition, a severe case in childhood of allergies to furry animals may each signal asthma that will persist into young adulthood, according to a new study."

It brought to mind a client call I responded to, several years ago. Our client manages a building in which offices a fellow who treats asthma and allergies, mostly in kids. He'd complained to our client that some of his patients were having breathing difficulties when visiting his office, clearly not a good thing for someone purporting to treat the same. He was sure that the facility was causing the problems, and pointed to a recurring water stain in a couple of ceiling tiles.

My client asked me to assess the situation, and to take some indoor air quality readings (we use a laser-based airborne particle counter to measure total airborne particles, in several size ranges, mostly in the range of allergens).

First thing I noticed was that the ceiling tile was not the problem: no ongoing source of water overhead, so mold would be unlikely to grow; but an old stain, apparently from a since repaired roof leak, had been painted over - repeatedly - with a standard latex paint. Stains gradually work their way through latex, so over the months of repainting, and the stain reappearing, the tenant thought a new stain was emerging. That's what "Kills" is for.

IAQ readings were higher than I expected, but I could see no other source of potential problems - until I interviewed the tenant. It seems that, to make his patients feel more at home, he often brought his two long-haired dogs into the office.

You'd think that someone in the pediatric allergy business would be aware that some kids are allergic to dogs.

09/03/2013

Just caught an article in the Phoenix Business Journal regarding Republic Services, a Phoenix based trash collection firm. Seems that they've reported to law enforcement and to credit agencies the theft of personal information on 82,000 current and former employees, off a laptop taken home by an employee.

Hate to admit it, but until I attended a BBB sponsored seminar on securing personnel information several years ago, I'd never quite realized the potential liability we had from paper and computer files of both employees and job applicants. (In passing, another good reason for our almost 40 year membership in both the BBB and the Chamber of Commerce - lots of good seminars and consultants. Nice gals to flirt with, too.)

The employee files we'd kept reasonably well secured. Job applications (and in this industry, one goes through quite a few) we were not quite as careful with, and we retained them for quite some time, mostly to be able to defend ourselves should someone in authority suggest that we were not hiring quite enough, say, trans-gender Armenians (such folks are a bit thin on the ground in these parts).

It turns out that Arizona law is somewhat stricter than Federal; for instance, should a burglar ever steal a drawer full of outdated job applications, with Social Security and other numbers attached, we'd have to notify every individual involved that his identity had been compromised. That's remarkably hard to do if the drawer the burglar stole contains the only contact information we had on all those individuals. Big fines follow.

So - we shredded anything outdated, or unnecessary. We took what was left - basically the application itself on any rejected applicant; redacted the SSN (we don't ask or record birth-dates), scanned that, put the scan on a thumb drive, shredded the application itself, deleted the scan from the computer, and stored the thumb drive off site (in one of those "undisclosed locations" like where they keep the Vice President during national security crises). For current and former employees, we already use a payroll processing firm; they keep the necessary personal information, so we don't need to, and have a pretty good security system themselves. And because they are the employer of record, they bear the liability for any security breach. (I don't work for me any more. I lease me back from them.)

So now it's pretty hard for personal information to leave the office, or to find itself stolen. But it did involve a whole lot of scanning and shredding.

We've offered janitorial services in Phoenix since 1974; hold the BBB's A-plus rating; and have long been in the forefront of the industry in environmentally sensitive cleaning for health, safety and security. Our office cleaning program can generally improve Indoor Air Quality, in the size range of most allergens, by a factor of 50%, as reflected in our ongoing IAQ sampling. We also furnish Green Seal certified recycled restroom paper products and janitorial supplies.